Ag secretaries past and present split on climate bill

WASHINGTON — It seems U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack and Sen. Mike Johanns, R-Neb., would disagree on the color of corn these days.

Johanns is a member of the Senate Agriculture Committee, which heard testimony Wednesday from Vilsack and others about the role of farmers in the climate change bill approved last month by the House.

By requiring power plants and factories to obtain allowances for greenhouse gas emissions, the bill is likely to increase prices for electricity, fuel and other farm necessities. But it also would provide credits to farmers for planting trees and practicing environmentally friendly techniques.

A new analysis by the Agriculture Department’s chief economist shows that farmers would receive more from the credits — potentially a lot more — over the long term than they would lose from their increased costs, Vilsack testified.

But Johanns, who was agriculture secretary under President George W. Bush, jumped on several aspects of that analysis. He pointed out that Vilsack was touting nationwide farm benefits without providing a state-by-state breakdown.

“It is no consolation to stand with one foot in the campfire, one foot in the ice bucket and say, ‘On average I’m in good shape,’” Johanns said, drawing laughs from the audience in the hearing room. “It is no consolation to say to farmers and ranchers they’re going to be in good shape on average if you don’t know the regional differences.”

He also pressed Vilsack on how much land farmers are expected to take out of production to plant trees.

Less farmland in production would drive up the price of crops used to feed livestock and compound the struggles of the average pork or beef producer, Johanns said.

“It beats the living daylights out of him,” he said.

Vilsack told reporters after the hearing that some of the land used for planting trees would be land not currently used for crops. He also said that Johanns is assuming that farmers will not continue to increase their productivity as time goes on.

“This is a new world here and how have farmers reacted in the past to new worlds? They have embraced it, they have utilized technology and they have become the most productive farmers in the world,” Vilsack said.

Vilsack also said that livestock producers can profit from innovation. For example, they can use new technologies to turn animal waste into energy.

But Johanns said the administration’s approach hammers “the little guy” who doesn’t have the capital to invest in expensive new machinery.

Johanns said the Obama administration is pushing a “wing and a prayer” plan for agriculture and that the USDA’s analysis is “very, very flawed.”

“I don’t think they had enough time,” Johanns said. “They’re in such a panic to get these things done.”

Vilsack took issue with that.

“I was looking at a letter from Secretary Johanns not too long ago where he commented on the fact that we’ve got great economists ... these people that he supported, he worked with, he knows that they’re professionals and he knows that they did a good job ... under the circumstances,” Vilsack said.

The two even differed on the department’s ability to handle the new program for farmers to receive the credits.

Johanns said the department needs a lot more time to ramp up, because it doesn’t have staff members who can administer the program.

Vilsack said he’s got people who have been working on the issue for 20 years.

Sen. Ben Nelson, D-Neb., also a member of the committee, raised his own questions during the hearing about the climate change legislation, which includes a system for trading the allowances. He suggested that a better approach would be a simple cap on greenhouse gas emissions, with no trading system.

Nelson said his mail is running “about 99 to 1 against” the current proposals.

John Holdren, director of the White House Office of Science and Technology, responded to Nelson that the White House has looked at different options and that existing literature says the trading system achieves emissions reductions at a lower cost than a simple cap.

Contact the writer:

202-662-7270, joe.morton@owh.com

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